Facebook just announced its latest product: Safety Check. When a natural disaster occur, all the users in the affected area get the chance to let their friends and family know they’re safe. You will have two options: You can either mark yourself as safe or state that you are not in the affected area. Your friends can also mark you as safe in case you can’t access to Facebook for any reason.

Some may be concerned about how will Facebook know their whereabouts. Here is how it will work according to the social network:

We’ll determine your location by looking at the city you have listed in your profile, your last location if you’ve opted in to the Nearby Friends product, and the city where you are using the internet.

For the time being, Safety Check will only be activated in case of a natural disaster. According to a comment posted by Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook has plans to “expand to more types of issues over time”. That will make the tool even more interesting.

There is no doubt Safety Check could be a very useful service but, what if someone is not safe? What if there is an earthquake and someone is stuck somewhere? Maybe he/she has some friends around who could help while rescue forces are extremely busy. Facebook could have an opportunity here…